Novell Cluster Services is installed and configured in a virtualization environment by using the same methods and processes as those used on a physical Novell Open Enterprise Server (OES) 2 SP3 server. It can be used in the host and guest virtual environments.

You can install Novell Cluster Services on an OES 2 SP3 Xen virtualization host server (Dom0). You can create cluster resources for the virtual machines by using the Xen and XenLive resource templates. You can fail over or cluster migrate these virtual machine cluster resources to different physical nodes in your cluster. Only the Xen and XenLive templates can be used in the OES 2 SP3 Xen host server environment.

For a virtual machine, you can use any virtualization hypervisor (such as Xen, KVM, VMware, and Hyper-V) that supports the SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 10 SP3 or later operating system, which is the platform used for OES 2 SP3 services. All templates except Xen and XenLive are valid on guest servers (DomU). When Novell Cluster Services is installed on an OES 2 SP3 guest server environment, no additional changes or special configuration are required. You can create clusters consisting of all virtual nodes, or use a combination of virtual and physical nodes.

Although many different cluster virtualization scenarios are possible, only those outlined in the sections below have been tested: